“Good that the virus will be quelled, but you’ve got to find the kid beforehand,” Ox said. “I don’t know why exactly, I just know.” Maybe his protective spirits had followed the Chesterfield case. Or maybe he had some clairvoyant abilities. Either way, when Ox made a definitive statement, I treated it as fact.
The cordless phone behind the bar rang. Ox answered and spoke for a minute before handing it to me. It was Dirk, calling to inform me that the kidnappers had made contact with Chesterfield again. The caller was the same female as before and this time she gave instructions for a drop of the cash. Her stated place was near the museum at Fort Fisher, a Civil War landmark just outside of Wilmington. When the money was retrieved, Jared would supposedly be released in a nearby public place. The drop location made sense since Fort Fisher was wide open and accessible by foot, vehicle, chopper, and boat.
“When?” I asked.
“Three days from now. Five thirty in the afternoon.” Right after the SIPA transfers were scheduled to finish. It couldn’t have been coincidental and confirmed my suspicion that the Social Insecurity creators were the alleged kidnappers.
“Why not sooner?” I said into the phone.
Dirk said that Chesterfield tried to schedule the trade for tomorrow, but the caller wouldn’t bite. Again, she let Jared speak briefly to prove he was alive and again, the call was made from a doctored, untraceable cell phone.
They were stalling. Fort Fisher was the perfect place for a drop that would never be picked up. It was all just a diversion because they had no intention of collecting a ransom. Why bother with three million when you thought you had fifty million coming? If Jared was a hostage, the kidnappers would have no reason to release him, either. He could ID them.
I passed along the information to Ox and he agreed that nobody would show to collect the ransom. The real issue was locating Jared. There was still the possibility that Jared was in on the scam from the beginning. But, more likely, the Social Insecurity creators snatched Jared to keep him from talking. According to the bartender boyfriend, Jared had given out a flash drive with Chesterfield Financial information to an old roommate, but then got it back. Which would explain the device I’d found hidden in the gym bag. But was he in on the plan? Had Eddie Flowers found out about the virus before taking a slug in the head? Had the secretary caught a whiff of the scam before dying of an overdose?
I finished my beer and grabbed a handful of hush puppies from Spud’s table as I walked out. I caught a snippet of their conversation even though I willed my ears not to hear. Bobby and Trip were making arrangements to take Spud’s car back to J.J.’s repair shop to fix the bashed-in rear bumper and Spud said there was no need to fix it since it was going to get stolen soon anyway. Trip countered that no self-respecting car thief would steal an automobile with body damage, even if he was being paid. Bobby suggested that they sell raffle tickets at the senior center and give away the car as the grand prize. I made myself keep walking.
I headed to the agency to do background research on Barb Henley and learn more about Senator Ralls, his wife, and his pot-smoking son. Politicians with too much power have been known to develop a sense of omnipotence. Did Senator Ralls believe that he was entitled to take whatever he wanted? Had he lost the family fortune? Was it possible that the senator and his son were in on Social Insecurity together? Or was I completely in the wrong ball court? Maybe none of the Ralls family was involved. I had to get some answers soon. Jared was running out of time.
As I sat at my desk in the agency, contemplating life and my immediate role in it, Lolly appeared in the doorway.
“I wasn’t sure I’d catch you here, but I was out running errands and thought I’d stop by.”
“Lolly,” I said, surprised to see her. I wasn’t aware that she knew the address of the agency. It is unpublished and not listed on our business cards. “How are you holding up?”
“Okay, I think, considering everything,” she said, settling herself into a chair across from my desk. Despite her situation, she looked fresh and pampered, as though she had just departed from a day at a beauty salon. Her short blond hair had been recently styled and the white sundress she wore was crisp and unwrinkled. “I’m just worried about Sam. This kidnapping is taking its toll on him. And of course I’m worried sick about Jared. There’s still an agent always hanging around the penthouse. I don’t know what to think anymore.”
Other than a sympathetic shoulder to cry on, I couldn’t ascertain what she wanted. There were plenty of other shoulders in Wilmington. “You’ll get through it, Lolly. Right now everything seems overwhelming, but we’ll get Jared home safely and put the bad guys in jail.”
She looked skeptical. “Have you found anything out? I mean, who are the bad guys?”
“You’re as up to date as anyone,” I told her. “I’m talking daily with your husband he’s keeping you informed, yes?”
“Sammy and I talk. But I think he keeps things from me so I don’t worry.”
“Such as?”
“What’s the real motive behind them taking Jared? Sam said something about it being odd that they didn’t jump sooner at the ransom money. If I kidnapped somebody, I’d want my money, you know?”
“It does appear that Jared’s disappearance may be a cover-up for something else that’s going on.”
That got her attention. She leaned forward and blinked long, mascara-darkened lashes over worried eyes. “Something else? I thought they were just after Sam’s money.”
“I can’t discuss hypothetical situations, but I can tell you that things are close to breaking wide open.”
“Have you told anyone else this? I mean, are you and the agents on the same page?” she questioned.
“I don’t have anything substantial to tell them, yet,” I said. “Besides, I’m not acting in any official capacity. I’m simply a hired hand, trying to help find Jared.”
“So Sam is paying you?”
“Of course. You didn’t know?”
“Well, no,” she said and tilted her head in thought. “It’s just weird how I hired you to follow Sammy. Well, I mean you did it for free so I didn’t really hire you. But now you’re working for him.”
The comment struck me as odd. It would seem that since they were a married couple in the middle of a family crisis, I would be considered as working for them. Not him. I didn’t answer.
“I guess I’m just getting stressed out,” she pouted. “Not knowing what’s going on makes everything worse.”
“Lolly, you just be there for Samuel and leave the worrying to all the people working on this case.”
She peered at me through teary eyes. “Okay.”
“Before you go, I have a question. How well do you know Senator Ralls?”
“Senator Ralls?”
“Yes, Sigmund Ralls from Georgia. Samuel knows him quite well.”
“I’ve met him but I don’t really know him. His wife is nice.”
“What about his son, Walton, who attended the Citadel at the same time Jared did?”
She studied her shoes for a moment. “Same as the senator. I’ve met the boy but I don’t really know him. I heard he got suspended for smoking dope. Jared never mentioned him so I don’t think they were good friends or anything.”
I asked a few more questions that revealed nothing and eventually the conversation reverted to polite, small talk. I hate small talk. Lolly left with a dramatic, impassioned plea for me to save Jared.
SIXTEEN
One thing I know from my time in the military is that it is tough to keep anything secret when you live in a dormitory environment. Near impossible, in fact. I drove Highway 17 down the coast from Wilmington to Charleston, South Carolina, and reached the Citadel in about three and a half hours.
The school has only two thousand cadets enrolled in any given year, but boasts a hundred-and-fifty-year history of prestigious higher education in South Carolina. There are four classes with the freshmen, or knobs, sitting lowest on the totem pol
e and the senior class ranking the highest. And while Charleston has a reputation of being one of the friendliest cities in America, the Citadel has a reputation for being one of last remaining good ol’ boys schools that take care of their own and discourage outsiders from poking around in academy business. Undeterred by the intimidating reputation, I waltzed in, acting like I was a long-standing alumni, even though the academy hadn’t started admitting females until 1995, the result of losing a lawsuit.
After flashing a fake Federal Bureau of Investigation identification card to three different faculty members, I found myself waiting to speak with some students in the lobby of the admissions office. I possess stacks of identification that officially declare me to be anything from a cop to an inspector for the Department of Agriculture. All of my identification is to the exact standards—shape, size, and color—for that particular agency, so the trick is to have the attitude to back up the plastic. Today, I was a Fed investigating the Chesterfield kidnapping. The folks around the military college had already been questioned by several of them and one more was just another annoyance to be dealt with.
I explained that I didn’t want to speak with instructors or staff, but rather anyone who had been in the same dorm with Jared and Walton Ralls while they were roommates. I also wanted Walton’s previous roommate, if the boy was still enrolled.
An hour and a half later, I had spoken with four kids and hit pay dirt with the last, Michael Stratton. As a senior, he’d developed a cocky attitude and made it clear he didn’t like talking to me. He was a stocky kid with a baby face, shaved head, and green eyes. He wore the traditional military uniform that all the young Citadel men wore.
“Are you planning on going into the military?” I asked him.
“Yeah. Air Force. So?”
“So you’ll be working for the government. I work for the government. We’re all on the same side,” I told him. “No need not to help each other.”
“You’re the one asking questions. I don’t see how that’s helping me.”
“For starters, I won’t have to explain to your commanding officer that you are an insubordinate little shit. Secondly, I won’t have to tell your parents that you purposefully impeded a federal investigation. That’s against the law.”
If anyone was breaking the law in this situation, I was. Impersonating a federal officer could land me in jail, but then I never had been one to shy away from a felony if it was for the greater good. Fortunately, the threat of talking to his parents got the boy’s attention and he instantly became cooperative.
“Sorry, ma’am,” he said. “I know you’re just doing your job.”
“My associates have already spoken with you?”
“Sure. They talked to everyone who had anything to do with Jared. I mean, I didn’t even know him that well and they questioned me for almost an hour.”
“Well,” I told him in a confidential tone, “the person I want to talk about today is Walton Ralls.”
“Walton? Well, he got kicked out, you know. Zero tolerance on drugs. Even his dad couldn’t get him out of that one.”
“Tell me everything you know about Walton. And about how Walton and Jared got along when they roomed together.”
He hesitated. “You know, there’s like this code of ethics around here. A good person doesn’t go around talking about his buddies, especially behind their backs. I … I’m just not sure—”
“Let me give you another code, son. It’s a code to live and help live. You don’t leave a teammate, or in your case a fellow cadet, behind,” I told him, inwardly smiling at how easy it was to bullshit a twenty-year-old. “Sometimes when you look at the big picture, you have to break the little rules. What I’m asking you to do is help us find Jared. Not leave him behind.”
“Talking about Walton can help you do that?”
“Yes.”
We strolled the campus while Michael Stratton gave me a lot to mull over. I learned that Walton was a computer geek and a good enough hacker to have broken into the school’s system to change some grades for a friend. He enjoyed a little pot now and then and didn’t care if he graduated or not. His only goal, according to Michael, was to embarrass the senator. He did just enough at the military academy to get by and his daddy was called on more than one occasion to get Walton out of trouble.
“I probably shouldn’t bring this up, but it’s not like I’m the only cadet who knew about it,” Michael said as an afterthought. Music suddenly reached our ears and when we walked around a building, a marching band came into view. The music was stoic and upbeat with a rhythmic background of drummers. The seventy or so students carried an assortment of instruments including bagpipes.
“That’s the Regimental Band and Pipes,” Michael explained. “They’re practicing.”
We stopped to enjoy the show for a few minutes before continuing our walk. “You were talking about something that several cadets knew?” I prompted.
Michael hesitated, lowered his voice. “Oh, yeah. It was just a prank, you know? Me and Walton were taking candid Polaroid pictures of other cadets. Stupid stuff, like surprising them on the toilet or whatever. So anyway, we caught Jared in, uh … a very compromising position with another kid in the shower. We didn’t know the other guy, but it was Jared for sure. Walton told Jared later that he threw the picture away, like it was no big deal. But I think he really kept it because he told me it might come in handy someday.”
I could still hear the sound of horns and drums, faintly carried with the breeze. On a verbose roll, Michael said that Walton constantly bragged about rendezvousing with an older woman. Laughing, my informant confessed that he and all the other cadets figured Walton invented the fantasy woman, since nobody actually ever saw her.
I’d gotten what I needed and thanked Michael Stratton for his time. Not bothering to inform the higher ups that I was done with their students, I hit the road and grabbed a roast beef sandwich from the Arby’s drive-through. I set the cruise control on sixty-five and wondered why Jared had attended the Citadel in the first place, knowing in advance he’d never fit in.
It grew dark by the time I reached the Block and Cracker greeted me with bubbly enthusiasm. He eagerly sniffed my shoes and legs to determine where I’d been. Satisfied that I hadn’t been disloyal by visiting another dog, he sat and waited to see if I’d brought him a surprise. I hadn’t, but I fed him a shelled peanut and he was just as happy with that.
Ox slid onto the bar stool next to me and we indulged in a couple of bottled Coors Lights. Since I hadn’t yet cut down on my beer intake, I figured I could at least go to a lower-calorie product. From our vantage point, we could see Spud’s car in the rear driveway. The bumper hung at an awkward angle and there was a sizable dent in the center of it.
Although Wilmington’s falling sun was filtered by a row of stringy clouds, the air remained dense with heat. The Block’s overhead ceiling fans spun at top speed and customers drank more iced tea than profit-generating booze.
“J.J.’s Auto Repair is sending a tow truck to pick it up in the morning,” Ox said. “Complimentary, this time.”
“Has he hired someone to steal it yet?” I asked.
“Don’t know. Your father is one hell of a thinker,” he said, and I couldn’t decide whether the comment was flattering or insulting. Maybe neither. It was probably just an observation.
The early evening crowd of customers was the self-sufficient type that wouldn’t need much for the next hour. They were locals who, content to watch sports on television and catch up on the latest neighborhood gossip, would get around to ordering appetizers or dinner later.
“I think you’ve been ruffling somebody’s feathers,” Ox said after a healthy swallow of beer. I noticed with dismay that, according to the silver label on my bottle, I was drinking one hundred and two calories. It wasn’t even a longneck. I’d have to run in the morning. I’d also have to quit drinking so much beer, I thought, and wondered if my malted beverage intake classified me as a borderline al
coholic.
“If I’d said that to you, about ruffling feathers,” I told Ox, “it would have been a politically incorrect faux pas, or racial discrimination, or something.”
“Yeah, and then I’d have to tomahawk chop you up top the head,” he said in a deadpan voice. I smiled. There were very few things that could get Ox riled up, and a reference to his Lumbee Indian heritage was not one of them. Tonight he wore a white cotton shirt with the sleeves rolled up and navy shorts with heavy socks and hiking boots. He looked as though he were about to depart for a safari.
“You got something going on tonight?” I asked him. “Maybe a gator hunt in the swamp, or a trek along the river?”
“Never know,” he said.
I’d learned to accept the mysteries in Ox’s life and didn’t press further. There was a real possibility that he was going for a midnight hike. “So, whose feathers have I ruffled?”
“Not sure. But a couple of bruisers came in this afternoon asking about you. They weren’t locals and they weren’t tourists.” Wilmington has its share of vacationers throughout the year, and while sightseers might stop in the Block for lunch, they certainly wouldn’t have reason to ask about me.
The men told Ox they were friends of mine, looking me up for old times’ sake. They asked if I lived upstairs and if I was home.
“They look like friends of mine?” I said.
“You have friends?”
“Ha, ha.”
“I told them you were probably out with your grandkids—” he grinned at the cut on my age, “—you being retired and all. They didn’t flinch. They obviously don’t know if you have grandkids or not. Doubt they even know what you look like.”
“Definitely not friends,” I said.
“Nope.”
Apparently, I’d been poking around in all the right places. A couple of thugs had come calling, which was good news. It meant that I hadn’t been wasting my time with a somewhat primitive, albeit effective investigative technique: when you don’t know who you’re after, keep poking around until you stir someone into action. Many criminals would never be caught if they didn’t act impulsively after their hot buttons were pushed.
T. Lynn Ocean - Jersey Barnes 01 - Southern Fatality Page 17